Kaiko

Kaiko is the genderswap based on official Vocaloid Kaito. Her name is a combination of "Kaito" and "ko", wherein "ko" pertains to a "child" or "girl", in Japanese. Also the word "Kaiko" means "silkworm" in Japanese. However, her name origin is purely derived from Kaito.

Design
Kaiko's current design is reminiscent to that of Kaito, a Vocaloid series 1 developed and distributed by Crypton Future Media. There are two popular portrayals, the first was in February 2008, Kaiko's attire is similar to the costumes seen in the video game iDOLM@STER, a dress worn by the character Kisaragi Chihaya, this costume is called "Gothic Princess" a coloration of the Cute & Girly costume set. It is a black sleeveless dress with white fur trim and a blue ribbon on the bustline, an extra piece for the top has pink trim. Over her shoulders is a capelet, which is also black and trimmed in pink and white fur. She wears white thighhighs, white earmuff headphones, black gloves and boots also trimmed in white fur. Kaiko of this version is commonly accepted among the fandom.

Her second design was in September 2008 by Brian Narita (aka. Sorbe), Kaiko's attire is reminiscent of Kaito's, done in a more feminine design. She wears a white dress with the lower half are done in swallow-tail style, the dress is backless stopping below the shoulder blades. She wears detached sleeves with a blue cuff, and brown knee-length boots following the color scheme of Kaito's pants. Her headset is black. For both designs Kaiko wears Kaito's signature blue scarf tied into a bow in front or to the side with the first design, and behind her neck with the second design. She has blue eyes and a short hairstyle, the color is known to be various shades of blue or purple.

With her second design, her right upper arm has the red mark "05", its significance is currently unknown.

Personality and traits
Kaiko has no defined personality, as she is an open source character. However, parts of the fandom portray her being an occasionally timid and dependable 'little sister' type, who is gentle and benevolent as well. Her height, weight, and optimum voice settings are undefined as well, and it is only the design by Sorbe that portrays her this way.

Since she is simply a genderswap, her character item is seen as ice cream the same as Kaito's. However, her own item does not seem to be determined when it comes to fanart. She has been seen with alternate takes on ice cream, such as ice cream pops.

2007 Early appearance
The earliest video to coin the name KAIKO (カイコ) was a Nico video called "Notice: Gender Reversal; female KAITO" (【性別反転注意】女KAITO) with the id (sm1745986), it was uploaded December 11, 2007 and featured a heavily photoshopped version of Kaito's boxart in the form of a female with twintails and shorts. Her vocal, however, was not from Kaito. A Japanese male singer's vocal was edited and used instead. The video is no longer available on Nico Nico Douga, though there are copies on other video sites. Judging by this video, it's possible that it had some influence in Sorbe's 2008 redesign. Another design was featured in the video "Top4Koma Vocaloid Studio vol.04" (突発4コマ ヴォーカロイド スタジオvol.04) uploaded in December 28, 2007; it references video (sm1745986) in the form of an address by having Kaiko come out of her apartment to grab a delivered package, inside the package is a scarf.

2008 Later appearance

 * Source - Vocaloid Wiki

Kaiko appeared again in February 2008 as a 'female Kaito' by producer IGASIO, who configured the voicebank to cover "Utsukushikereba Sore de Ii", an opening from the anime Simoun. An original song was produced in October 2010 by G9Fried@GRM who configured Gumi Megpoid's voice bank to produce Kaiko's voice. For this example it is not uncommon for fans to use Vocaloid voice banks that have no relation a derivatives origins as a being a voice for the character.

An acknowledged Derivative?
Kaiko is a derivatives that continues to be a popular Crypton relation, but is not officially recognized by Crypton Future Media, the publisher of the Character Vocal Series for Vocaloid software. However, on the company's twitter there was an acknowledgment of a blunder when referring to Kaito's soft Append while it was still being developed. They commented how playing with the gender factor leaves the voicebank sounding feminine and 'cute', which was unintentional to the voicebank design.

Voice configuration
Due to Kaito's update to V3 voicebank, it became possible to appropriately manipulate Kaito's voice to sound feminine.

Relationships

 * The proposed fanon relationship appears to be popularized by having her be a little sister to Kaito. The degree of their interaction and emotion changes from person to person.

Appearances

 * MikuMikuDance (MMD), 3D software
 * MMD models of Kaiko were created in 2008 by various modelers. In November 2009 the second popular Kaiko design was created by modeler Brian Narita (aka. Sorbe). See the Kaiko (Brian Narita) page for details, and also see other Kaiko models.


 * Artwork
 * Search Kaiko on deviantArt Pixiv Piapro


 * Media
 * Search Kaiko on YouTube NicoVideo

Trivia

 * The name 女KAITO (Woman;female KAITO), KAITO姉さん (KAITO girl;sis) has also been seen.


 * A controversial rumor within the Japanese fandom is that Kaiko's gender is unknown, there are statements of Kaiko being a male cross dresser or a transvestite.

Gallery
Note; this is not a gallery for every fanart out there, just for reference